This collection of essays, arising from a conference held in Boston, USA, in 2006, covers a range of topics about the institutional, cultural and political origins of preservation movements in Europe and North America, as well as a number of case studies drawn from slightly further afield. In her introduction Hall argues that the emergence of international – if not universal – heritage value can be identified in developments in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Three papers explore specifically Anglo-American themes. Hall herself reviews conservation strategies at Niagara Falls; in the wake of increasing industrial development and the attractions of popular spectacle, the British/Canadian and American governments engaged in trilateral diplomacy to develop an agreed strategy. She argues that the concept of a common Anglo-American civilisation, a ‘supra-national community of English-speaking peoples’, served as the ideological framework for such agreements. Otte explores the diplomatic background to the creation of a public ‘shrine’ at Sulgrave Manor, the sixteenth-century Northamptonshire home of Lawrence Washington, great-grandfather of the US president. The acquisition of the property, anchored to commemoration of the centenary of the war of 1812–14, was part of a range of elite diplomatic initiatives casting the common ground of ‘Anglo-American civilisation’ in a darker light, celebrating explicit notions of racist supremacy. Holleran, contrasting preservation developments on both sides of the Atlantic, argues that in the USA successful campaigns were dominated by private individuals and non-professional groups who raised resources outside the state system; in Europe, where centralised administrations were usually well established, state-led solutions were much more often sought.

In another comparative study, Swenson reviews the different political contexts of heritage legislation in England, France and Germany. Extending state control over monuments involved a range of potential conflicts about the roles of Church and State and the importance of protecting private property; she argues that, whether legislation itself emerged as the most effective resolution, there was no longer much doubt that the state in these countries had responsibility for the protection of monuments by the eve of the First World War. Ola Wetterberg discusses the disputes in Sweden between architects, archaeologists and art historians in the competition for influence and authority about historic preservation.

Three interesting papers deal with places further afield. Drawing on primary archives of the 1870s, Anne Blackburn addresses the preservation strategies of the early colonial regime in Ceylon. Care of ancient monuments was seen as part of a civilising process, in which an aesthetic architectural discourse was tied in with a need to feed the developing scholarship of philology. She frames this activity as part of a competitive display of Imperialism as a cultural force. The different strategies of colonial rule are nicely addressed: the governor's passion for the region was closely tied to a strategy of agricultural improvement and to his admiration for the Buddhist faith and the local Sinhala elite.

Raymond Cohen documents the sorry but fascinating history of the Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem. Against a background of international political conflicts and alliances, he charts how the competing Christian sects charged with the care of the church privileged their rights of custodianship over the material care of the building, resisting repairs by rival Christians, to the ultimate damage of the church fabric.

The story of Hagia Sophia is set against a similar background. Slowly re-entering European consciousness in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, it came to symbolise the Ottoman oppression of Europe. After the British gained control of Constantinople in 1918, an enthusiastic Christian lobby of senior academics and political and religious figures sought, unsuccessfully, to have the building redeemed for Christian service.

Two further papers address British heritage. In a thoughtful paper Chris Miele reviews the roots of the Anglican Church's engagement with building heritage, presented as a levelling force, especially from the 1850s, when understanding of architectural history became much more widespread. The replacement of private pews by free seating made this legacy apparent to all who came to worship; the shift from private benefit to public good is also reflected in a move from monuments to increasingly anonymous benefactions. A secular discourse about preservation and ‘authenticity’ in the interest of a non-sectarian wider community also emerged, founded on the highly political argument that the public had a moral ‘right’ to historic buildings as common cultural property. Touching on the theme of the title, he argues that the overseas work of the SPAB (Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings), especially in Venice, may be presented as an early recognition of ‘universal significance’ but this was far removed from the very practical concerns of the diocesan authorities in England. In a final paper, Peter Mandler flags up the need to consider the opposition faced by preservationists, and the often paradoxical relationship with their opposing ‘powers of darkness’, who might be equally driven by aspirational vision, but with a different aesthetic.

Although there are useful studies here, I am not convinced that the book is well served by its title. Certainly some international exchanges and sharing of practices can be seen, but the world of the Sulgrave Manor diplomats with their overtly racist agenda seems far removed from any appreciation of universal human value in the twentieth century. Collectively, some clear themes emerge: the demonstrable importance of nineteenth-century aesthetics, for example, especially the classical past, in determining preservation values, and the interconnectedness of the relatively small number of individuals who acted in the vanguard of preservation projects on the international stage. Some are very familiar names – Viollet le Duc, William Morris, John Ruskin – but we also meet James Bryce, sometime law professor, member of parliament and Britain's ambassador to the United States, Frederick Law Olmsted, the designer of Central Park, and Governor Gregory of Ceylon, husband of the now much more famous Lady Augusta of Coole Park.

The book is generally well produced with a useful consolidated bibliography, but some of the papers would have benefited from more illustrations.